


Real At Last

by Ngrey651



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Family, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, Vore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-16
Updated: 2016-10-16
Packaged: 2018-08-22 18:40:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8296045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ngrey651/pseuds/Ngrey651
Summary: The Barrier's finally down, and Frisk goes back through the Underground to let everyone know the good news! Especially one monster in particular, W.D Gaster. Gaster has returned to normal, eager to return to his brothers Sans and Papyrus...but feels he cannot risk Frisk RESETTING, destroying all of their progress. What will he do? Will he show MERCY? Or FIGHT? Contains Vore.





	

With the Barrier fallen, something new had come to the Underground. It wasn't hope; that had been there long before Frisk first walked out of Toriel's cave. No, it was something better than hope. It was certainty. It seemed to hang in the air of the cavern high above. As Frisk returned to Snowdin to visit his friends, there was a sense of certainty among them, unspoken but powerful, that their hopes had been fulfilled. 

 

The news was spreading, slowly, that the Barrier had fallen and the Underground was open. As Frisk met his friends again, he assured them that, yes, it was all true. The Barrier was gone. His news was met with simple smiles and nods, as if this was the most obvious, most simple, and best thing in the world. 

 

Frisk stopped by Sans' and Papyrus' house on his way out of Snowdin. He'd not seen them since they ran off after the Barrier fell. He was eager to spend time with the first two people that welcomed him to the Underground, the two that had given him that first feeling of hope as he looked out from Toriel's cave at the long, dark cavern that lay between him and the world above. The first two members of his family.

 

When he knocked on the door, Sans' voice came from inside: “Hey, come on in.” Frisk tried the door. It was locked. From inside, Sans' voice came again, “Oh hey, the door's locked. I'd help you out, but I'm just a recording. Come back later.” Frisk smiled, then continued deeper into the Underground.

 

He made his way out of town and followed the river to Waterfall. The silver dusting of the air gave way to a misty spray. Snowdin's crystalline beauty melted into the rush of water, the soft pop of luminescent fungus, and the shimmering, firefly ghost lights that lit up Waterfall. Frisk strolled through the ghostly waterlands. He remembered a time when he ran through here, terrified and excited. Chased first by monsters that simply thought they were doing what was right. Then, chased by a friend, one who didn't yet know she would be his friend. Frisk wondered where Undyne was now. When he crossed a bridge, he couldn't help but peeking over the side, half expecting to see a dropped spear in the water below.

 

Frisk walked past the mouse hole and the crystallized block, the cheese within gone, taken by the crafty rodent. He followed the blue, wavy walls of sandy stone... until the wall was broken by a strange sight. There in the wavering stone on his left was a gray door. It was a simple door. The sort used in any good house on earth. It could have been the door to a closet, a porch, a bathroom... Frisk's room. It gave a weird sense of nostalgia to the calm waterlands.

 

It was uniformly gray. Even the door knob was the exact same gray as the wood and the frame. It was set perfectly in the wall as if it had formed there over eons along with the stone itself. Except that Frisk knew it had not been there for eons. He'd walked this way many times before and most of the time there was only rock. Most of the time. Once, though, he came this way during his quest in the Underground, and once he found this door. 

 

That first time seeing it, the door had given Frisk a sense of something wrong with the world. Not morally wrong, not even necessarily bad. More a sense of two parts of the world not aligning properly. As if he were looking at a puzzle, slightly askew. Now, the feeling was still there, but also gladness. He had hoped to find the door again. Frisk hoped that, now that the Barrier was fallen, he could come to understand more about the door and what was inside.

 

Taking hold of the gray knob (it was neither hot nor cold; it did not feel like any temperature) he opened the door. Light came from nowhere, uniformly illuminating the bare, pastel white walls. They didn't seem to be made of stone or wood or plastic or fabric or metal. They were simply walls, forming a small hall from the door leading into a slightly but not much larger, bare square room. 

 

In the center of the room was WD Gaster. Frisk smiled when he saw the strange apparition, and Gaster, seeing that Frisk recognized him, smiled also. His skeletal face had frightened Frisk the first time he encountered this ghostly room; the lines above and below his eyes gave a sort of broken appearance to him, which his lean, tall body, raggedly clad in black, only augmented. He'd looked to Frisk less like a ghost and more like the lights one forgets when falling asleep. After that first, brief encounter, Frisk had not felt scared of Gaster; only sad for him.

 

Now, as he stood in the center of that pale room, there was something more physical about the skeleton. Before, Frisk's eyes kept trying not to see him, trying to focus as if Gaster were nothing but a mistake in his vision. It had given the young human a headache. Now, Gaster seemed real, though still quite ghostly. There was a hazy quality to his body. Frisk could tell that, with the Barrier fallen, Gaster was much more real than he had been in that first encounter, but he was still somewhat ephemeral. 

 

Still, Frisk ran inside. “You're really here. Mostly. I was afraid you wouldn't come back.”

 

Gaster laughed. Before, he had not really had a voice. Before, when Gaster “spoke” his name, Frisk had not heard it so much as he remembered having forgotten it. Simple things about the strange skeleton had formed in his mind as if he were recalling the words to an almost forgotten song. Now, he heard Gaster's voice; it was pleasing, soft and musical, though cracked in the smallest way. “Thanks to you. When you took down the Barrier, I could see again. Not the way I did before, dreaming the world, everywhere at once.” He pointed to his eyes, two deep, black pits lit from within by gentle lights, flickering with intelligence. “From here. My own eyes. I knew right away it was you that did it.”

 

Frisk blushed. The young boy had already been extolled for his bravery, his courage... his determination. He was a bit embarrassed to be praised more. “I had a lot of help.”

 

Gaster nodded. He knelt down beside Frisk, laying one hand on his shoulder. The hand was incredibly light; actually, it had no weight at all. He could feel it against his skin but it didn't seem to have any sense of depth. Frisk could not imagine how broken Gaster must have been for him to still be THIS incorporeal. 

 

“I know,” said Gaster. “I saw everything, in my own way. You have been such a marvel. You've been so kind to every monster you met, despite what so many of them did to you. Or at least, what they tried to do.” He pressed a bony finger against Frisk's chest. “You could have fought to defend yourself, but you only used this here. I'm impressed, Frisk. There was a time I thought no one person could love that much. Now, you've made me think, perhaps, anyone can love that much.”

 

Frisk didn't know what to say. He glowed bright red. Gaster, seeing this, laughed delightedly. “I'm embarrassing you! I'm sorry. You remind me so much of my little brothers.” Frisk looked up, asking, “Who?”

 

“Your friends. Sans and Papyrus.” He turned his head to the side, grinning, one eye glowing blue. “You see the resemblance of course? I'm not as handsome as my little brothers, but...”

 

Frisk realized how obvious it was now. How many other skeletons did he know? He giggled, saying, “I see it. I should have realized it before!” Thinking of Sans and Papyrus, Frisk suddenly pulled on Gaster's arm. “We should go see them! They haven't seen you in... how long?”

 

Gaster answered, his voice tinged with melancholy, “Ever. In some ways. It'll be like meeting them for the first time. But...” he smiled, “they are ever my little brothers. I've been watching them even longer than I've been watching you. Now I can finally....”

 

A troubled look crossed his face. Frisk, not wanting Gaster to feel sad for all that had happened to him, said again, “Come on. You're here now. We can go see them. You can go home.” He added, after a moment. “With me.”

 

Gaster looked at Frisk. He was filled with an intense love for this human child that he could hardly express. In all his scattered existence, this boy had burned bright like the light of the sun to a dreamer. Now he was awake and seeing clearly the brave, kind boy for the first time... and he saw the terrible thing he had to do.

 

Gaster, laid his hands on Frisk's shoulders, pulling him close. Frisk didn't resist. He had no reason to fear anyone in the Underground now. He felt that here, if nowhere else, he was among nothing but friends. 

 

“You really are something special,” said Gaster. “You've shown such love. To my little brothers. To everyone. You've fixed things I did not even know were broken. Thank you, Frisk.” Again, red bubbled to his cheeks. Frisk squirmed, about to tell Gaster to forget all of that. But Gaster said, less cheerfully, “I'm afraid, though, that I can't let you leave this room.”

 

Frisk frowned. He looked up into those bright, black eyes. They wavered with a mix of emotions. He said, quietly, “What do you mean?” Frisk tried, gently, to pull his shoulders away from the ghostly hands. Gaster didn't let him go. The old feeling of danger began to creep in, like his first encounter with one of the monsters of the Underground.

 

Gaster couldn't look him in the eye anymore. The skeletal doctor looked away and said, “I've seen a lot, Frisk. I've seen a lot in you. I've seen the kindness you showed to all of my friends here. And the love you showed my brothers. You didn't have to. You could have fought to defend yourself but you never did. You found another way. But, there's a power inside you far more dangerous than even my most misguided experiments.”

 

He laid a hand on Frisk's chest, over his heart. Frisk realized it was pounding rapidly. Gaster went on, “I know you don't want to RESET the world. I know you think you would never send us all back. Sans to being alone. Papyrus to being unfulfilled. Undyne, filled with hate. Alphys with fear. All of us trapped behind the barrier again. And me,” he grinned. “The man who speaks in hands. I know you don't want to do that but... you can. You're a child, Frisk. You could get scared. You could get angry. Tragedy could strike. You may not even intend to do it. You could be hurt and, in the process, without even meaning to, you could undo all the good you've done. That's why... I'm sorry, but I can't let you go.”

 

Frisk's body felt cold. Gaster, the strange presence who had been underneath and behind things he could never quite see, whose name had come to his lips once like a series of shapes rather than sounds, who he finally met face to face after all his work, was not going to let him leave. What did that mean? Frisk had an idea. He remembered when other denizens of the Underground wouldn't let him leave. He remembered how, some, almost succeeded. 

 

He began to shake. Gaster's eyes flickered with sadness at having hurt Frisk. He hugged him tightly. Gaster's body felt like the empty space of the air had been cut out. There was no discernible substance there. Only not nothing. Frisk licked his lips, his throat feeling dry, and said, “I won't let my friends be hurt again. Any of them. Not even you, Gaster. Not even by me.” 

 

Gaster rubbed Frisk's back, nodding. “I know. But even if you didn't mean for it to happen, if anything ever went wrong, if even one little moment ever caused you to slip... you could take away everyone's happiness. Everything you've done. I've seen your power abused by others. I stood outside of the world as it reset time and again. I can't let it happen.”

 

“Then what... are you going to do?”

 

Gaster sat back, his white, ghostly head looking down on Frisk with a lonely smile. He said, “Close your eyes. Please.” The way he said it, Frisk knew that whatever was going to happen would not be good. He was young, but he was wise. The feeling of danger crept up his back, like fingers running up his spine and into his hair. In his pocket, he still had the Garden Knife he'd found in Asgore's home... but he didn't even consider it. He'd talked down monsters willing to kill him. Gaster didn't want to hurt him; he was forcing himself on. He really believed that whatever he intended to do HAD to be done. 

 

Frisk shook his head. “I won't. If you have to do it... then you have to. But I want to see. ” Gaster smiled and the smile of him was heavy and forlorn. He squeezed Frisk's shoulders softly. He said, “You'll try to fight,” but Frisk only said, with a laugh, “I'd probably lose. I'm not very good at fighting.” Gaster laughed too, but his laugh was humorless, sad. He pulled Frisk closer.

 

“This won't hurt,” he said. Then, he opened his mouth. His white, skeletal jaw spread apart. Within was black.  Pure black. There was no shape or substance to the black. Frisk could see the outline of Gaster's tongue as it pushed out over his teeth, but the interior was a darkness without distance or depth. Gaster leaned forward, his jaw spreading wider, and the darkness grew.

 

Frisk tried again to pull away, but Gaster held him firmly. He reached up, trying to block Gaster's mouth with his arm and hand; Gaster's jaw spread wider and both slid inside. Slimy flesh ran along Frisk's skin. As with the door knob to the gray room, the skin had no sense of heat or coolness at first. It was terrifying; like touching solid space. But as Frisk's skin continued to rub along it, slipping further inside, a ghostly warmth began to resonate, similar to that given off by a pillow after someone has laid on it. It might have been a comfortable heat... had it not come from a throat waiting to devour him.

 

“Gaster, don't,” Frisk said. He didn't shout, but he kept trying to pull his arms back. The flesh around his hands squeezed tight. Gaster brought his jaw down, holding the young human's head in his mouth. He swallowed his arms, squeezing them into a tight tunnel of black-as-black flesh. Frisk could hardly see the gray room anymore. The blackness of the magical flesh was beginning to blot out the rest of the world. Against the skin of his face, that weird, unearthly texture rubbed, heat slowly working into Gaster's flesh. Along with something else; solidness. Gaster's flesh felt, at first, the same as his hands had felt. Like they were solid nothingness. As that warmth spread through the black flesh, real, earthly texture began to form. Frisk felt the soft, slick smoothness of the inside of Gaster's cheek. He felt the firm, lumpiness of the top of his mouth. Gaster's tongue became squishy against his cheek. And the back of Gaster's throat grew rippled, wet. It squelched with another gulp and pulled Frisk's head down.

 

Frisk was lifted off his feet. Gaster scooped him up, one arm under his legs, the other under his body, holding him so Frisk didn't hurt himself going down. Frisk tried to say, “You don't have to do this!” but his words came out muffled and flat against the flesh that cocooned his face. He was thrown down into complete darkness. Gaster's throat was sightless as the bottom of the sea. No, deeper. Frisk suddenly remembered words he'd never read but knew from somewhere.  _ DARK DARKER YET DARKER  _ The blackness was nothing like existed in the world above or below. Not at the bottom of the ocean. Not in outer space. It was the blackness of dreams. That great universe of darkness that closes around you in sleep; an infinity of dark that touches the skin.

 

The handle of the Garden Knife rubbed his side. Frisk didn't reach for it. He squirmed, trying to make room enough to speak in the tight throat. Gaster swallowed again, the convulsion of muscles dragging Frisk down. Through a tight ring of flesh and into a more open space. His arms and head spilled out of the squeezing tunnel. They rubbed down along a slimy, smooth wall that stretched around him, expanding to take him in, but still holding firm enough that, as his back slid in too, Frisk curled up. Free to speak, Frisk pressed his hands out into the darkness, feeling the walls around him. He shouted, “Gaster, please. You can trust me!”

 

Gaster shut his eyes. He held up Frisk's legs with one hand; by now, the young human's thighs were already sliding into his throat. Only the bottom of his legs remained. He kicked but only weakly, as if afraid of hurting Gaster. With the other hand, Gaster held his belly. A great dome of lightless flesh pushed out through his dark coat. Inside, under his hand, he felt the little life of the one who had saved him. Saved him and everyone else in the Underground. 

 

Gaster tilted his head back. His tongue ran up Frisk's leg and began to ease it down into his throat. The last of the human boy sank slowly out of sight. Still he didn't lash out. Frisk felt his feet passing over Gaster's now very fleshy, wet tongue, into his squishy throat. Gaster really meant to go through with this. Frisk wanted to cry; the corners of his eyes burned. He thought of what Gaster had said, how Frisk's power would always be a danger to everyone's happiness. But Frisk couldn't imagine anything he could ever want more than for his friends to be safe, to be happy, to be free. He'd fought so long and hard for everyone. Everyone had fought so long and hard for their own hope. Nothing could make him want to undo all of that. He wanted Gaster to understand that... but Gaster didn't. Even for all he'd seen, there was no way he could see inside Frisk's heart. Frisk felt Gaster's hand through the skin of his belly; he pressed back with his own, a little sign that he was still there. Gaster felt it.

 

With a final gulp, the last of Frisk wiggled down through Gaster's chest and into his gut. Gaster let out a small sigh of relief. It was over. His belly hung heavily in front of him, sagging. He could feel the human just under his ghostly skin. Inside, Frisk could see nothing at all. It was a void. The flesh rippled around him, though, and he felt it. That familiar warmth of a pillow against his head. A well loved blanket over his skin. The walls of the stomach rippled and kneaded him softly, feeling like a hundred hands, rubbing him to sleep. Still, Frisk had an idea of what would come next. 

 

Cradling Frisk in his arms, rubbing him gently, Gaster said, “I'm sorry, Frisk. I know you want to do good... but if there's even a chance you might use your power, even a small chance, then the whole world is at risk.”

 

Frisk's throat felt tight. He said, “I would never ever do it.” Gaster hugged his stomach and said, “I know you wouldn't mean to. I know. Don't worry. This won't hurt. I'll absorb your body, and it will be just like going to sleep. You'll slip off into dreams. When I do, I'll keep your Soul in me. Only I can hold you; that way, even when you... fade, your power to RESET will not work. Everyone you helped, everyone you love will be safe, Frisk.”

 

“Except me,” Frisk added. Gaster didn't respond. He continued to rub Frisk through the flesh of his gut. He felt the effect of simply having Frisk inside him. He felt Frisk's physical existence bleeding into him. Form and feature returned to him. His body began to grow real, corporeal, not just the vague half-existence he'd endured since the Barrier fell. Gaster shuddered in delight; he felt his own warmth spreading back through him, the sensation of being alive and real that only he could really know. What other Soul, monster or human, could claim to have lived through never existing?

 

With real flesh, though, came the final danger. Gaster knew Frisk still had the Garden Knife. He knew that he'd given the boy no choice. He did not want Frisk to try to hurt him, but there would be no way to talk out of this, no way to win him over, and no way to run. Gaster HAD to absorb Frisk and keep his Soul inside him. Otherwise, the whole world was in danger. Which meant Frisk's only option to save himself was to Fight.

 

Gaster waited, expecting the blows to start coming. He knew that his stomach should still be ghostly enough to endure the damage. He rubbed Frisk, feeling the human shake and sniffle... but he didn't lash out. 

 

Frisk curled up in Gaster's gut. A low smell of an almost-familiar body began to grow around him. It felt so warm and safe... but he could feel it beginning to eat away at him. Not like a human stomach; it was a magical sort of absorption. His mind grew foggy; he felt his body growing warm and vague. He was disappearing into Gaster. This was not okay. Frisk didn't want this... but he wasn't going to Fight Gaster. And maybe Gaster was right. Maybe it was too dangerous for him to have his power. Maybe this was best. If anyone had to hold his Soul forever... at least it would be a friend.

 

Frisk let the walls gently knead him and hug him from all sides. He didn't shout or cry. His thoughts slowed and drifted further and further apart. A weird lightness seemed to spread into the darkness all around him. Frisk felt Gaster's hands holding him, and he felt safe. He felt truly safe. He closed his eyes...

  
  


***

 

Frisk opened his eyes. He blinked several times, not sure what he was seeing. Vague, grayish white all around him. Something held him under his back. Frisk moved his body, feeling his limbs, all still attached. Nothing ached or hurt. Where was he? How was he? What had happened? 

 

He turned his head up and there was Gaster, looking down at him. He had a sad smile on his ghostly face, the same one he wore the first time Frisk saw him. Frisk realized that he was in Gaster's arms, those strange, unearthly limbs supporting him gently. Once again, Gaster's body had a texture as of nothingness made flesh. Firmness without substance. All the warmth and softness that Frisk's body had given him was gone.

 

Looking down at him with those starry eyes, Gaster said, “You really meant it. You are so vey very interesting.”

 

“What happened?” asked Frisk. “Why did you let me go?”

 

“Because you really did mean it. Even when it would have only been natural for you to fight to defend yourself, even when you were on the verge of fading away, you never did. You never fought... and you never tried to RESET.” He rubbed Frisk's head, looking at him with a new sense of affection. Something deep and powerful. “You really are that good.”

 

Frisk frowned, looking away, shaking his head. “I just didn't want to hurt you. I didn't want to make everyone unhappy.”

 

Gaster laughed, that weird, slightly cracked sound. He hugged Frisk. Frisk was surprised at first, but he hugged the tall, gangly skeleton back. With laughter still in his voice, Gaster said, “I think losing you would have made them unhappy. What could my little brothers find to replace you? No. You deserve to be happy too. That way you grow into a fine young man who never has need to use his power. It's not my place to keep you bottled up. Only to help you grow.”

 

He let Frisk go, rising up again, a strange, wispy sight in the middle of the gray room. Frisk thought for a moment, then he said, “Gaster, when I was inside you, you started getting warm. I could feel you. The real you.”

 

Gaster nodded. “That's not a surprise. I was becoming corporeal. Such a strange feeling, after so long.” He held off saying how wonderful it felt; he didn't want to make Frisk feel bad. But Frisk grinned, taking Gaster's hand and tugging him along towards the door to the gray room.

 

“Actually... I have an idea.... After all, you deserve to be happy too.”

 

***

 

A clamor of pots and pans rolled like thunder out of the kitchen. Amid the den, a loud, full-throated laugh erupted. “Nyeh heh heh! I've almost got it! I've almost got it!” A sudden, crashing tumult followed. Pans rattling against the floor. Water spilling. A dog barking. A shout of, “I've done it!”

 

Papyrus emerged from the kitchen a moment later, his face black with smoke, his cape singed. Sans asked, “Well? Did you do it?”

 

“Yes!” Papyrus shouted, holding up an empty, stained, partially melted pan. “I successfully failed to create human-safe spaghettie sauce. The boiling temperature refused to go any lower than 'scalding.'” Sans clapped. Frisk laughed, saying, “I don't think I would taste very good with marinara.”

 

“Nope,” said Sans. “You need to be whisked. Whisked Frisk.” He winked one starry, black eye. Papyrus shouted, “I hate it!”

 

Gaster laughed his weird, cracked laugh. He stood in the center of Sans and Papyrus' living room. He'd tried sitting on the couch with Sans and Frisk, but his strange body faded through the furniture. He was still only somewhat real, and it seemed only Frisk could touch him. He said, “Now, I don't think you need any improvements. You taste fine, Frisk.”

 

“But this is your homecoming,” the young human said. “You should celebrate.” He reached up as he felt something on his head. He pulled down a hotdog bun. Sans looked as if he hadn't moved on the other side of the couch. The skeleton shrugged and said, “I know. Needs mustard.”

 

Papyrus suddenly grabbed Sans and Frisk in a huge hug, crying loudly. “I'm just so happy to have my brother back! I missed him so much I even forgot to miss him.” As Papyrus hugged his neck, Sans coughed out, “Yep. I'm choked up over it.” 

 

Gaster reached out, his hands passing through the boney arms of his younger brothers. They stopped, looking up at him. Frisk saw for one instant in a still light a look on their faces like one who has gone around the world to finally come home. They'd found something they didn't even know they'd lost. And so had he.

 

Gaster moved his hands through his brothers and onto Frisk's shoulders. Those ghostly bones settled on Frisk, firm without texture or temperature. But now, even just that simple contact seemed to change them. They slowly began to warm through Frisk's stripped shirt.

 

“Ready, Frisk?” Gaster asked. Frisk nodded. He hugged Papyrus. The big skeleton squeezed him tightly, shaking him back and forth. He hugged Sans. After a long moment, Sans patted one hand against Frisk's back. He made a small, quiet chuckle. When Frisk pulled away, he saw Sans wink.

 

Frisk stood up, Gaster leaning over him like his own shadow, cast high up a wall. The towering doctor knelt. He hugged Frisk, his great dark coat wrapping around them both like smoke. He said, “This time won't be the last. Only the first. Welcome home, Frisk.” 

 

There was no Garden Knife this time. No feeling of danger. No sense of an ending. Only a beginning. Frisk watched Gaster open his mouth. He saw the wide tunnel of darkness... but it felt more comforting now. The darkness of a night so calm and so safe, that even the smallest night light was unneeded. The dark of home.

 

Hands pressed under his arms. Frisk looked back to see Sans and Papyrus scooping him up. They lifted him off the ground, his feet wiggling in the air. They raised him high, up over Gaster's head. Gaster tilted his head back, his throat becoming an open slide down to his stomach. Frisk closed his eyes. He felt like he was being tucked into bed. He was. He was home. And Gaster's stomach, every night, from now on, would be his bed. 

 

Gently, his two friends' eased him down into their big brother's mouth. Gaster's jaw spread wide. The ghostly flesh immediately bloomed into warmth and softness as Frisk slid into it. A quiet little sound squelched around his legs as Gaster swallowed. Frisk felt himself easing down into the warm, comforting cradle of Gaster's body. It rose around his legs, over his waist, up his stomach, like the tide of some loving ocean. Frisk breathed easily the almost-familiar scent as Gaster's tongue slid over his back, cradling his head. Sans and Papyrus let go. Gaster swallowed, and Frisk slid away down his throat, gently falling into the bed of his gut.

 

Without a pause, Frisk curled up in Gaster's belly. The soft walls pressed and rubbed him all over. He felt every inch of him hugged from all sides, the walls around him warm and plush. Gaster cradled his stomach, stroking it with one hand. He rose and the floor boards creaked beneath him. Sans and Papyrus starred, watching the very subtle change as their brother faded back, fully, into the real world. Nothing visibly changed about him, but both of them could see it. With Frisk's help, he was whole again. And this time, every night, with Frisk tucked safely inside him, their brother would be able to walk and touch and feel again.

 

Feeling his own weight and warmth and reality, Gaster opened his eyes and smiled at his brothers. He reached out his long arms, pulling them into a close hug, pressing them gently against his belly. “My brothers,” he said, his voice soft but welling with emotion. Sans, giving out another one of those low little laughs, hugged Gaster fiercely, careful not to press his stomach too hard. Papyrus openly wept into Gaster's shoulder, patting his back heavily as if to confirm he was still real. His stomach, he was much more gentle with. Gaster, feeling his brothers on both arms, feeling the small heaviness of Frisk, alive and safe in his stomach, said, more correctly, “My family.”

 

In the dark, Frisk felt his family embrace. Whole again. This time, there'd be no more resetting or fading away. Every night, Frisk would have a safe bed to curl up in. And Gaster would have a full body to reach out and show his brothers and all of his friends that he was still here.


End file.
